Does anybody use space heaters to compliment the wood stove?

  • Active since 1995, Hearth.com is THE place on the internet for free information and advice about wood stoves, pellet stoves and other energy saving equipment.

    We strive to provide opinions, articles, discussions and history related to Hearth Products and in a more general sense, energy issues.

    We promote the EFFICIENT, RESPONSIBLE, CLEAN and SAFE use of all fuels, whether renewable or fossil.
Status
Not open for further replies.
I may have to temporarily hook up the old 8' electric baseboard heaters that were left in the house when I moved in.
We did that our first few winters also. Pricey!!
 
B4 we ripped out the old oil furnace we had 3 of those oil filled space heaters. We used them once for about a week straight when the furnace was under repair....

They ran 24/7....

We never had an electric bill so HIGH as we did that month!:eek:


I like the oil-filled ones though....nice steady, constant, quiet heat. But NOT cheap.
 
A few years ago, I'd recoil against the idea of using any resistance electric because of the cost. Now when you factor in the efficiency of fuels like propane and oil, electric (in my area anyway) is pretty close to the same cost. Am starting to think about installing some permanently in the bathrooms.
In fact, if this winter continues on it's same plane and there are additional fuel shortages and spikes in prices, when I run out of wood (which is coming in about a month, unless there's a very early spring), I may have to temporarily hook up the old 8' electric baseboard heaters that were left in the house when I moved in.
Those things are great backup heat sources. The slightly higher electric bill is cheap insurance. My sisters ranch home is heated with these(electric resistant baseboard) and well insulated. She rarely gets a bill over $200 a month in winter. But If you have a poorly insulated space you will pay dearly.
 
I just got one, once I saw the arctic air making a return, we have one room that just doesn't get warm, we've lived with it but its the room my wife spends 90% of her time in so I bought her one of those popular electric heaters everyone seems to have nowadays. She only runs it when its frigid, although we have more frigid coming up.
 
Yup, in my 2 yr olds room. He tosses and turns, and never keeps his sheets on him. We've got a little 110 (ceramic??) heater with "Eco option" from Home Depot. It's supposed to be one of the more efficient electric space heaters. It gets set at 65 when the outside temp is below 10ish. The vent fan in the bathroom (other side of house through 3 doorways from stove) has an electric heater as well. It's hooked up to a timer on the wall, so you can set it and walk away after a shower and it will turn off if you forget.
 
Refuse to turn on space heaters at all cost. We use heating blankets instead at night if necessary. Only been necessary on 0 degree and below days.
 
I have used those oil-filled radiators, and also once had one of those Vornado heaters that worked pretty well. My husband would freak though if I leave anything like that plugged in overnight or anything, so there's kind of no point. Down comforters are very toasty, and wool blankets!
 
No space heaters here or of any heater running while the fireplace is going, though before bed will turn oil filled heater on in bedroom so as the fire dies down thermostat will kick on it and keep bedroom warm through the night.
 
I have baseboards throughout the house.

I'll click them on when I get home from work to get the house up to temp faster while running the stove up to temp. As soon at the house warms up I shut them down and maintain with the stove. Hasn't really made a difference on the electric bill.

I also have a small radiator in my ham radio room. Usually run that on low. Don't want that expensive stuff getting cold
 
Yup. We have a 2600 sq ft house with the lower level fully finished with the wood stove at one end in the rec room and my daughters bedroom at the opposite end from the wood stove. We have a oil filled heater that we keep in her room at a low temperature. My wife got mad at me for taking it and using it on our rental properties when the furnaces would die so I picked up another one and wrote it off.
 
Have been struggling with this. We have an attic bedroom with baseboard heat. Rarely used now, but will be in the future--and just stopped working this year. Rather than fix, I'm putting in a ventless NG heater up there. I should finish it on monday or tuesday. We also have a poorly insulated playroom at the far end of the upstairs that gets cool. The house has 100 year old radiators with NG in the other rooms. I installed new valves on them so that I can actually turn them off. So now I can turn on the furnace for 45 minutes and heat up the 1 radiator in the playroom. Not sure if this is more or less costly than running a space heater all day...

EDIT: Just as an aside, using a conversion of 1 ccf = 29 kwh, the equivalent cost is $1 for NG and $4.35 for electric. So running my NG for long enough to warm the system is 1 ccf, or about the same as running the space heater for 4.5 hours.
 
Last edited:
Kero and just bought a small electric today. Going to save kero for power outages, forgot how much I hate the stuff. I have water pipes in unfinished part of basement, were reading 35 on the IR last night.


I was running a little ceramic heater in the crawlspace for the same reason. I panicked when the IR told me my pressure tank was like 17°. I took a regular thermometer down and it was actually closer to 40°. Just a word of caution that I wouldn't put too much trust in an IR for pipes where being off by a few degrees could cause major consequences.
 
  • Like
Reactions: osagebow
Oil filled for the upstairs bedrooms, infrared for quick warm ups in the morning till the stove gets going (be very careful with these) and a couple of Kero's just in case. Keep these clean and light and douse them outside for minimal fumes, can't be beat for output. 2 @ +-20Kbtu will heat the whole house.
 
Those heated mattresses and blankets are the work of the devil! How can any one be expected to leave the bed and tend the fire at three in the morning, on a cold night while wrapped in one of these things? LOL
 
  • Like
Reactions: JA600L
http://www.bcremc.com/appliance.html

I found this site to be very interesting and helpful. From what I see it makes a lot more sense to run a space heater and wood stove than the heat pump.
 
An electric fleece blanket is the most amazing thing ever. Its like sleeping in whatever heaven should feel like.
 
I was at menards this weekend and there were lots of people in the heating aisle. I walked down it to take a peek at a garage heater i have been eye balling and the shelves were pretty damn barne for any heaters. Looks like people have been making a run on heaters with all this cold weather.
 
If its below 10 degrees at night I will in the bedroom because of the baby in their. Can't get it over 65 degrees without it. Bedroom is furthest away from the stove. 65 is good for me but she wants it about 68 for the kid
 
I run an oil filled radiator in the basement below the water pipes to keep them from freezing. When the outside temp gets closer to zero I put it on a 12hr timer overnight and let it go to work.

This time of year the basement is in the low-40's. A bad cold snap will drop it into the upper 30's. Since heat rises the oil radiator keeps the pipes near the ceiling in the 50's.

Yes, I have alot of air leaks and I'm slowly working on that.
 
I may have to temporarily hook up the old 8' electric baseboard heaters that were left in the house when I moved in.
(Note: that's my original quote.)

We did that our first few winters also. Pricey!!

According to my rates for electric and price for propane, not much of a difference when you factor 85% boiler efficiency and propane at $2.80 (going to ? at next fill) vs 100% efficiency of electric. The 240v 8' baseboards were left disconnected and loose in the attic. Apparently they were used in the additions before the hydronic baseboard heat was installed and connected to the rest of the central system.

If people start panicing about fuel, prices could soar. I miscalculated and just found I have an extra row (1.5 face cord) than I thought in my stack so that might give me an extra 2 weeks or so if I'm careful but am still not going to make it through winter. I haven't called my propane company but if shortages in the midwest translate to higher prices here, it might make sense to wire and hook up those 240v baseboards to 120v and get some heat out of them rather than pay through the nose for propane.

I mean I can burn pellets in large coffee cans with vent holes drilled but they aren't as good as logs, TSC's eco bricks aren't available locally. Lowe's version run about $9 for 30 lbs which is over twice the price of the TSC's or even pellets. So elec might be cheaper at 100% efficiency.

Though am starting to think about replacing my main wall a/c with a mini split heat pump if I could do it myself except for the ref line hookup. But it does take me awhile to plan out and do things like that. This is all just worst case scenario. Hopefully temps will moderate, I can do some scrounging to fill in, and maybe even get some of next years wood early like I did last year but this will be about a month earlier.

But If you have a poorly insulated space you will pay dearly

Not great not poor. I've already tried using my antique portable plug in baseboard electric to warm up the bath and MBR at shower time vs. turning on the bedroom zone of the boiler -- the portable electric heats up faster and better localized. Will probably be using it more vs. the boiler.
 
Last edited:
Status
Not open for further replies.